


I'll Be Here

by wallmakerrelict



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Hurt Keith (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Shiro (Voltron), POV Third Person, Protective Shiro (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-16
Updated: 2018-08-16
Packaged: 2019-06-28 10:40:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15705582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wallmakerrelict/pseuds/wallmakerrelict
Summary: The robot explodes. The lions fall. Shiro struggles with leadership in the face of personal attachment. And when his decisions have terrible repercussions for Keith, he is forced to contend with his own guilt and grief.Luckily, someone once reminded Keith not to give up on himself.





	I'll Be Here

He felt Keith falling before he saw him. While the explosion was still blocking out the sky and everyone on the bridge of the Atlas was hiding their eyes from the terrible light, Shiro sensed the Black Lion as it rode the wave of force back into the atmosphere and tumbled toward Earth. He reached out to it with his mind. Their bond had once been strong. He tried to wake it up, to convince it to save itself. To save its pilot. 

But the Black Lion, due to distance or damage or perhaps because Shiro just wasn’t its paladin anymore in the way that Keith was, didn’t respond. The spots faded from Shiro’s vision just in time for him to see the streak of light following the lion on its downward trajectory. Shiro turned his head – Atlas’s head – to see four more lines searing through the sky all around them. Then the lions disappeared over the horizon and were gone. 

“Damage report.” Shiro’s voice was so calm that for a second he thought it had come from someone else. Fear was buzzing in his ears like a bee in a jar. His mind was stretched thin over the expanse of the Atlas. His body was about to collapse. But his crew took their cue from the strength in his voice and leaped into action. 

Veronica was the first to respond. “We lost a significant amount of power from those swords,” she said. “Operating at 9%. We’re up but we’ve lost most of our functionality. No shields, no weapons.”

“We don’t need those now,” Shiro assured her. “The fight’s over. We just need to help the paladins. Holt, is the crystal re-charging us?”

Sam’s face flickered up on Shiro’s viewscreen. “Yes, but the crystal took a hit too. It’s recovering – our rate of gain is accelerating. But at the moment it’s negligible. It’ll be days before we’re even at half power again.” 

“Coran,” said Shiro. “Tell me about the lions.” 

Coran’s fingers were flying over his console. “Yellow and Red fell nearby. Green fell far out to the east, barely within range of our sensors. Black was on a trajectory towards the garrison base. He might even have hit it. I lost track of the Blue Lion about a mile out to sea! I’m hailing all five, but there’s no response. No energy readings for any of them either. They’re completely offline.” His words were professional, but his shoulders were tense and his voice clipped. He was as worried as Shiro. 

“I’m going to get us in the air,” said Shiro, though even the thought of it was exhausting. “Get me visual on the lions.” 

He felt it as a physical strain as he lifted the Atlas to its feet and jumped, firing thrusters to maintain the upward velocity. When Atlas had first transformed, Shiro could feel the power of the crystal which had once been the Castle of Lions flowing through every inch of the structure and into the crystal in his arm. It interfaced seamlessly with his mind. Whatever he thought, Atlas did. For a moment, it had been as effortless as breathing. But with the crystal drained, the flow went the other way. Atlas was weak and sluggish. Every movement had to be cajoled out of it through Shiro’s force of will. He increased the boost on Atlas’s thrusters and had to lean on the console to keep his own legs from buckling underneath him. 

“I have visual!” Veronica gasped. On the main screen was a bird’s eye view of the pockmarked battlefield. One by one, targeting circles blinked up. Two just below the Atlas, one over a patch of trees on the eastern horizon, and one looping around the smoking ruin of the garrison base. “I can’t see Blue. Allura went underwater.” 

“Captain,” said Coran softly, though his mustache was quivering with pent-up tension. “What do we do?”

_Get to Keith._

The answer sprang unbidden into Shiro’s head. For a moment, it was the only thing that he could think. Nothing else mattered. Get to Keith. Make sure he was safe. Then worry about the rest. 

But that was only the answer that Shiro, the man, wanted to give. It wasn’t an answer worthy of Shiro, leader of Voltron. It certainly wasn’t worthy of Captain Shirogane, of the Atlas. He looked at Veronica’s and Coran’s faces turned up towards him hopefully, and Sam’s still on the monitor. All of them wishing just as hard as Shiro that they could disregard everyone else and help the one they loved. And Shiro thought of Hunk, who had no one on the Atlas to speak for him. 

They could not put aside their love any more than they could remove their own hearts. But Shiro could not let that love make decisions for them. He could only let it motivate them, and then make the fairest and best decision himself. 

“Zoom in on Hunk and Lance,” he snapped. A few taps from Coran’s fingers, and the main screen split into two and brought up magnified views of the Yellow and Red Lions. Each lay in a deep crater in the rock of the desert, their eyes dark, their limbs slack. Shiro tried not to think about what that kind of impact would do to a human body trapped inside. 

Coran pointed excitedly at the screen. “Look! The prisoners!” 

Shiro followed his finger to the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, where the edge of the Galra prison camp was just visible. People were streaming out of it. Dirty, bedraggled, injured people. But they weren’t scattering from their place of captivity. Their bodies formed a column as they all moved with common purpose. “They’re going to help the Yellow Lion,” Shiro breathed. It was a small relief, but a welcome one. 

“Only four others to go…” Veronica replied. 

“Right,” said Shiro, his mind racing to come up with a plan. “How are the MFEs?” 

A second screen popped up beside Sam Holt’s face. This one contained the faces of cadets Griffin, Rizavi, Kinkade, and Leifsdottir crammed together as they hovered over the monitor in the hangar. “All the other fighters and shuttles are inoperable,” Rizavi reported. “But since the MFEs weren’t hooked up to the ship at the time of the attack it seems we escaped the energy drain. We’re still at about 25% power after that fight.”

Shiro took only seconds to finalize his plan. “Griffin, Kinkade. Transfer your ships’ power to the other two. Leave yourselves at 5% each and use that to get to the Red Lion. Once you’ve got Lance, go to the Yellow Lion and see about Hunk. Organize the prisoners, get them to help you. That Galra encampment is big enough that it must have some kind of medical facility. Get Lance and Hunk stabilized as best you can. Rizavi, Leifsdottir. You’ll need the extra power because you’re doing a fast burn to get to Green. Help Pidge, then check in. You’ll all get your next orders once we know the status of the paladins.” 

“Yes, sir!” the four shouted as they turned and ran to prepare their fighters. 

“What about us?” Coran pleaded. 

“We’re going after Blue,” said Shiro, who saw relief wash over Coran’s face at the news. “There’s no time to waste. She’s the only one we don’t have positioning on, and we can’t risk losing Allura in the ocean.” 

“Good show! Took the words right out of my mouth!” Coran crowed. Then, he hesitated. “Er, can the Atlas even go underwater?” 

“We’re about to find out,” said Shiro tersely as he adjusted thrusters to fly the Atlas towards the coastline. “Veronica, contact the garrison base as we fly over. Almost everyone is aboard the Atlas now, but we left behind some technicians and perimeter forces. I know the base took a beating, but find me someone there who can help Keith.” 

“On it!” she said. For what felt like hours, the only sounds on the bridge were the roar of the engines, the tap of Veronica’s keys as she relayed text information, and her voice quietly hailing the base defenses through the microphone in her console. By the time she looked up at Shiro again, the base was well within view, the Black Lion lying lifeless in the garden of its ruin. “A lot of our people died in the attack when the shields were down. Those that are left… some are trapped by debris, some are injured. The medical wing didn’t take any damage, so they can help Keith if they can get to him but… it might take them a while to get to him.” 

Shiro looked out the viewscreen. The Black Lion was sliding off to their left as they continued toward the water. It looked so close, but Shiro knew that diverting to reach it would spend precious power that the Atlas didn’t have to spare. 

Veronica’s eyes flicked between Shiro and Coran. “Captain,” she stammered. “Are you sure we want to continue on toward the Blue Lion instead?” 

Shiro took a deep, steadying breath. “Hold course. We don’t know how much energy we’ll burn when we’re underwater, and we don’t know how difficult it will be to find the Blue Lion. If we divert to help Keith, we might be forsaking Allura.” 

The deathly still silhouette of the Black Lion disappeared off the side of the monitor as the Atlas passed it by. Shiro felt a piece of his heart tear away with it. 

“Sir?” Veronica’s shaky voice snapped Shiro back to focus. It was the first time she had sounded anything other than in control. She held her face rigid, but in her eyes Shiro could see the creeping fear that was also threatening to overtake him. “Sir, do you really think any of them made it?” 

So far, Shiro’s fear had taken the shape of Keith broken, bleeding, in pain, and alone waiting for someone to help him as his life slipped away. For a moment a deeper fear burst through: Keith already dead, the Black Lion his tomb, and no amount of haste able to save him. Did it even matter which paladin they ran to first? Was this a rescue mission? Or a recovery? 

“We have to assume they did,” Shiro said as they drew even with the coast. 

Just then, Griffin’s voice burst onto the bridge in a crackle of static. “Cadet Griffin reporting in! Captain, we’ve got Lance. He’s gonna be okay. Pretty banged up, unconscious, and his leg’s broken but his vital signs are strong. We’re transporting him to the site of the Yellow Lion now.” 

Veronica crumpled in her seat, her hands over her mouth to stifle a sob of relief. Then just as quickly she straightened and resumed her work with renewed vigor. “We’re at 6% power now,” she reminded Shiro. 

“We’re right over the last known location of the Blue Lion!” Coran announced. 

“Here goes nothing!” said Shiro. He stopped the thrusters that were keeping them aloft and let Atlas fall into the sea. 

Atlas was engineered for space, so sealing it to make it watertight was simple. Maneuvering was not so easy. If Atlas was sluggish in the air, it was practically disabled underwater. Every movement felt like dragging limbs through molasses. It seemed to take years of falling before Atlas’s feet found the rocky seabed. Then, the moment Atlas moved, silt was kicked up all around and the external cameras were blinded. 

“We have to hold still and let the water clear so I can try and get a visual on the lion,” said Veronica. 

Shiro straightened Atlas’s legs and bid it not to move. But before the silt had even finished swirling in front of their monitors, he felt an oncoming vertigo as the bridge began to tilt. Just a little at first, then more and more. Atlas was falling over. Shiro had no choice but to slide one of Atlas’s great feet forward to catch and stabilize it. That kicked up a new cloud of silt, and visibility was worse than ever. 

“What the quiznak is happening?” Coran demanded, gripping his console to steady himself as the bridge jolted. 

Sam was ready with the answer. “We’re in a strong current. With Atlas’s huge profile, it’ll be especially affected. It’s pulling us out to sea!” 

Atlas listed forward again. Shiro was forced to let it take another step, then another, just to stay upright. The monitors were a kaleidoscope of gray and brown. 

“Fire the thrusters!” Coran yelled. “Fight the current!” 

“No!” said Shiro. “If this is where Allura landed, she’s caught in the same current. We need to follow it.”

“But we can’t see!” said Veronica. 

The Atlas took another step, and the whole ship was rocked by an impact. Too late, the silhouette of a giant rock formation appeared through the haze. Shiro guided Atlas around it and continued along the current’s path. 

On Shiro’s monitor, Sam was talking to someone off-screen. When he returned, he said, “Captain, that rock tore a couple of leaks in the crew quarters. We’re sealing off that area, but, er… try not to do that again.” 

“Working on it,” Shiro replied with gritted teeth. 

They were making their way through the treacherous path when they received their second update from the cadets. “Kinkade here. We’re at the Galra base. The prisoners brought Hunk to the medical bay. A couple of them are doctors, and they’re trying to figure out how to use the Galra tech to help him.” 

“Is he okay?” said Shiro. 

“He has a bad head wound,” said Kinkade. “His parents are here. Everyone’s shouting. Griffin’s in there trying to get them organized.” 

“Will he make it?”

“They don’t know.” 

Shiro felt it like a punch in the gut. Lance’s good condition had given him hope. But the other paladins’ fates were still uncertain. Keith’s fate was still uncertain. “Do what you can. Keep us updated.” 

When the connection with the cadets cut out with a fizzle of feedback, Shiro looked up at his bridge to find it quiet and nervous. Veronica had a hand up to her mouth. Coran was looking at the floor. 

“They’re doing everything they can for Hunk,” he told them. “We have to do everything we can for Allura. It won’t help anyone for us to divide our attention.” 

The irony wasn’t lost on him. His attention was already divided. It was with Hunk in that Galra base. It was with Lance - safe, but hurt, and about to wake into fear and horror. It was with Pidge, still lost. Most of all, it was with Keith. Had anyone at the garrison managed to mobilize? Was anyone even looking for him? Shiro almost ordered Veronica to check again, but he hesitated. He had just asked his crew for their focus. The least he could do was give them his own. 

He was about to offer more words of encouragement when the Atlas struck another rock formation, this time hard enough to spin them around and knock them to the ocean floor. Shiro clenched his teeth and grunted as he worked to control the fall. Atlas fed the pain of the impact into Shiro’s bones and in return, it drew out his stamina. By the time the Atlas was back on its feet, Shiro was shaking and panting, and sweat was beading on his face. 

“Holt?” he demanded. 

“We’re working to contain the damage,” said Sam. 

“Veronica?”

“4% power.” 

Shiro steadied Atlas against the current and tried to think clearly. How much longer could he keep this up? How many more hits could they take? How much power would they need to get back to shore? This wasn’t Voltron - it wasn’t just his own life he was risking. Nearly the full complement of the garrison base was aboard Atlas, civilians included. How long could he look for the Blue Lion without being careless with all their lives? 

But the alternative was also unthinkable. To abort the mission now would be to abandon Allura. And if Allura was lost, and Shiro had used the last of Atlas’s resources trying to get to her, then he had also failed Keith. 

The com pinged awake, fuzzed out for a moment, then resolved to a clear signal. “Captain,” said Leifsdottir’s voice. “We found the Green Lion.” 

Shiro nearly gasped, hungry for good news. “How’s Pidge?” 

“External injuries minimal,” said Leifsdottir. In the background, Shiro could hear the sound of footsteps and clanking metal and he presumed that they were in the process of removing Pidge from her lion. “But her pulse is weak. We’re having trouble getting a blood pressure reading. And…” 

Rizavi’s voice cut through the background noise to interrupt. “Pidge! PIDGE! Leifsdottir, she stopped breathing!” 

“KATIE?!” Sam screamed. Shiro hesitated only a second before muting his microphone. 

“Hold please,” said Leifsdottir in a preternaturally calm voice. The sound through the com became muffled by movement. Then Shiro heard what he thought was the clatter of a medical kit being opened and rifled through. Rizavi’s and Leifsdottir’s voices overlapped each other as they worked. “Get an EKG on her, I’m starting CPR.” “Pushing a milligram of epinephrine.” “What is that, V-tach?” “No, it’s a disorganized rhythm.” “She’s still not breathing.” “Keep up those compressions.” “The pulse oximeter isn’t even reading.” “Give the epi a chance to work.” “Do we defibrillate?” “Not unless… wait, it’s going to V-tach.” “That’s a P wave! She’s converting! We’ve got sinus rhythm!” 

Then Shiro heard the sweetest possible sound: Pidge gasped, then groaned, then coughed weakly. The noise over the com subsided to the soft sound of three women breathing and the rhythmic beep of the EKG. 

“I’m back,” said Leifsdottir as if nothing had happened. 

Shiro managed to choke out, “Good work.” 

“Thank you, sir. She’s alive, but she’s not stable. What should we do now?” 

Patience yields focus. But Shiro had no time for patience, and he was all out of focus. His paladins were slipping away from him. He didn’t want to be the one to decide. If he couldn’t save them, then he wanted the peace of not being responsible for their deaths. 

If it didn’t matter who he ran to, then he wished he’d run to Keith. 

He’d been silent for too long. The bridge was starting to shift with a restless energy when Coran spoke up. “I’m picking up another audio signal,” he said carefully. “It’s faint.” 

“Let me hear it,” Shiro managed to say. 

Another voice crackled to life, barely audible through the heavy interference. “…elp……….. one…. someone……………. Lance?... ANYONE?” 

A roar of excitement went up on the bridge. 

The voice was Allura’s. 

Hope surged through Shiro, making him forget his exhaustion and despair. “Coran! Lock onto that signal! Clean it up, amplify it, get me a location! Don’t lose it!”

“Yes, Captain!” Coran yelled, already working. 

“Leifsdottir! Get Pidge to the garrison base.”

“Sir,” said Leifsdottir. “Isn’t the Galra base closer?”

“Yes, but we don’t know if they’ve figured out how to use the equipment there. The extra travel time is worth it to get her some place we know can help her.” 

“Yes, sir!” The connection ended as Leifsdottir scrambled to follow orders. 

Shiro unmuted Sam’s microphone. “Sam, sit this one out.” 

Sam Holt looked to be holding himself upright by sheer force of will. His face was as pale as a ghost, and there were tears on his cheeks. “I can work,” he said. 

“You don’t have to do this.” 

“Shiro,” said Sam, standing up a little straighter. “I can’t be there for Katie right now. Please let me help her friend.” 

The same determination that Shiro felt was written all over Sam’s face. “Fine,” Shiro told him. “Sam, I’ll get you back to that base and Katie will be there when we arrive, understood?” 

“Thank you, Captain.” 

Shiro turned back to the bridge. “Coran?”

“I’ve got her, I’ve got her!” Coran muttered. Then, into his microphone, “Princess? Can you hear us?” 

This time Allura’s voice came over the com strong and clear. “I hear you!” 

Shiro called out to her, “Allura, this is the Atlas. We’re on our way. Help us find you.” 

“Shiro! I’m underwater. My lion is damaged, and there are leaks everywhere. The water is rising.” 

“Where are you?” Shiro begged. 

“I don’t know!” said Allura, her voice rising in panic. “I can’t see anything. Shiro, the water is coming in fast.” 

Shiro was so focused on Allura’s voice that he didn’t realize that the current had caught them again until Atlas slammed against another rock pillar. The hull shrieked as it scraped against the stone. This time, instead of allowing Atlas to be thrown, Shiro gripped the rock and held fast. He couldn’t let Atlas drift out of range of Allura’s signal. 

“Coran! Find her!” Shiro grunted as he strained to keep Atlas steady. They were sliding around the side of the rock, slipping back into the stream. Atlas’s fingers stuttered over the surface of the rock. Shiro couldn’t get a firm grip. He dug in harder.

Allura’s voice sounded afraid but steady through the com. “I don’t have much time left. If you can’t get to me, you should go after the others instead.” Shiro could hear water sloshing in the background of her transmission. 

“We already are,” Shiro assured her. “Lance is injured, but he’s okay. Pidge and Hunk are in bad shape, but they’re getting help.”

“What about Keith?”

The piece of rock Atlas was hanging onto broke off. They almost fell back into the current before Shiro brought Atlas’s other hand around to snag a new grip. “We don’t know yet,” he said. 

Allura’s line was silent for a moment. Then, calmly and sweetly, “He’ll be alright. Don’t give up on him, Shiro.” 

Finally, Coran shouted, “Got her! Behind us! Behind us and to our right!” 

Just then, Atlas lost its grip and spun chaotically into the current. Shiro gripped his console as he was nearly whipped off his feet. Atlas staggered, trying and failing to catch its balance. Its feet couldn’t seem to find the bottom. They were tumbling end over end. The swirling silt below and the bright water above flashed into view again and again as they twirled. 

And then, on one of the passes from dirt to sky, Shiro spotted a flash of metal and a shade of blue deeper than the murky water around them. It was the Blue Lion, crumpled on the ocean floor and pinned against a rock by the current. 

Shiro fired thrusters. The silt swirled around them again, but Atlas was already moving out of the cloud as soon as it was kicked up. He corrected for the spin, streamlined Atlas’s body, and pointed it back into the current. He could still see Blue. Bubbles were escaping from its chassis as air was replaced with water. 

“I see you, Allura! We’re coming!” Shiro shouted. 

“Hurry!” Allura pleaded. She was panting. The sound of sloshing water was louder than her voice now. “Hurry!” Shiro heard her gasp, and then the only sound was the water. 

“NO!” Coran shrieked. 

“We can get to her in time!” Shiro poured more power into the thrusters, fighting the current and the resistance of the water. He clawed his way upstream. Atlas strained to match Shiro’s exertion. 

“2%,” said Veronica. 

She was so close. In space, it would have been nothing to close the distance. In the water, every yard was a battle. 

“1.75%”

Atlas reached out a massive hand and came up just short of the Blue Lion’s nose. The movement jostled the rock, and the lion floated free. 

“1.5%”

The lion was caught in the current now too, and about to be swept past the Atlas. As Shiro reached out for her one more time, a hatch opened in Atlas’s shoulder. It led to an empty cargo bay. As the water rushed in, Shiro lined the opening up with the Blue Lion’s trajectory. 

Blue was swept inside. Shiro slammed the hatch closed after it. 

“Sam, get a team to cargo bay three!” Shiro ordered. “Everyone else, hold on! We’re getting out of here!” 

He bent Atlas’s legs, pointing its feet at the ocean floor, and boosted them toward the surface. 

“1.25%” 

Atlas streamed through the water. It was still sluggish and difficult, but at least up here the water was clear. Shiro could see the surface. 

On the main screen, Coran pulled up a video feed of the cargo bay where the Blue Lion was resting. The water was drained from the room and the rescue team rushed in. A flood of water escaped the cockpit as they breached it to pull Allura out. Her helmet was shattered, her suit torn. Her hair was everywhere. Her body was limp. 

“Princess…” Coran whispered, horrified. 

With one last push, Atlas burst through the surface and into the bright ocean air. 

On the video feed, Allura convulsed and heaved the water out of her lungs. She coughed and coughed, shaking painfully. But her hands and knees were on the floor and supporting her weight. She was conscious. When she finally collapsed again, exhausted, one of the medics flashed a thumbs-up at the camera. 

On the bridge, Coran punched the sky triumphantly. 

“1%, Sir.” 

Atlas’s thrusters sputtered and flared as their power waned. “Hold on!” said Shiro as he poured the last of their power into a one mighty surge. 

Blue-white light blasted out of every port in Atlas’s frame. The force kicked up a spray of water off the surface of the ocean behind them. Atlas was catapulted toward shore in an awkward, uncontrolled arc. While hanging in the air at the top of the parabola, the thrusters abruptly cut out, the remaining power in the ship not enough to sustain them. Shiro tried to coax just a little more life out of them to help break their fall, but they didn’t respond. 

“Brace for impact!” Shiro broadcast to the whole ship as they plummeted. 

The main screen showed them falling toward water, water, water. It rushed by underneath them as they fell lower and lower. And then, at the last possible second, water gave way to rock and sand. The beach appeared on screen just in time for them to smash into it. 

The ship’s safety systems cushioned the impact, but Shiro was still thrown to the floor. There was a metallic screech as they slid to a stop, and then the bridge shifted one last time as they settled into the sand. 

Shiro scrambled to his feet. “Everyone okay?” he said. There were sparks coming out of his console. The monitors were on but flickering as if on their very last dregs of power. It was dark. The main lights had gone out, and the room was illuminated only by the orange of the displays. It was quiet without the hum of the engines rumbling through the ship. One by one, the people on the bridge sounded off that they were unhurt. 

Last of all, Veronica gave him a smile and a thumbs-up. “Holding steady at 0.33% power, Sir. Looks like we’ll have to wait here for someone to pick us up.” Then something blinked up on her monitor, and she spun to look at it. Her eyes widened. “Sir, a team just made it to the Black Lion.” 

“Let me talk to them,” said Shiro. The words rasped in his throat, almost afraid to say it. Afraid of what he might hear next. 

A fuzzy connection yielded a voice he didn’t recognize. “Captain, we’re entering the cockpit now.” 

“How’s the pilot?”

Rustling and footsteps in the background. Low voices, unintelligible. Shiro choked back the urge to scream at them for an answer. Then, the same voice as before. It sounded breathless, disbelieving. “Oh my god,” it said. “He’s alive.” 

Blood pounded in Shiro’s ears. Alive. But in what condition? There was no telling how long it would take for the garrison to organize well enough to send someone to the coast and evacuate the Atlas. Would Keith still be alive then? Shiro barely heard the com chatter about transporting Keith to medical; Veronica answered for him. He couldn’t stop thinking about the possibility that Keith might die surrounded by strangers while Shiro was stuck in the sand. 

He tried to pull Atlas to its feet. But Veronica was right. The tiny flicker of power they had left was barely enough to keep the monitors on. Still Shiro reached deep into the ship, into its guts, its bones, into the crystal. Trying to draw out some miracle. 

The ship didn’t respond. Shiro roared in frustration, making everyone on the bridge flinch. 

If Atlas wouldn’t fly to Keith’s side, then Shiro would do it himself. If Atlas wouldn’t give him the power, then he would supply it. 

Instead of reaching into Atlas, Shiro reached into himself. He knew that quintessence existed within all living beings. He’d used his own to reboot the Black Lion after it had been attacked by the Komar. He had no idea if he had a chance of powering something as large as Atlas. Still, he followed the path of the crystal’s connection into the center of his own being, and he pulled out the light that shone there. He poured it into his arm. And then he poured it into Atlas. 

“S-sir!” Veronica stammered, shocked. “We’re at 0.5% power and climbing!”

The monitors stopped flickering and shone brighter. The lights blazed back to life. 

“Shiro, what are you doing?” Coran demanded. 

The engines thrummed as they started back up. The bridge lurched as Atlas shifted in the sand. 

“I’m getting us home,” said Shiro. And Atlas stood up and flew. 

Shiro didn’t know if he’d be able to keep this up for three miles or three feet. But as long as Atlas was in the air, he kept feeding quintessence into the crystal to keep it there. And Atlas kept flying. 

“We’re losing power again…” Veronica said. “No, wait. It’s stabilizing. Holding steady at just under 1%. How is this possible?” 

Shiro felt like his body was glowing with quintessence. He didn’t even feel tired or sore anymore. The same power that was charging Atlas was bolstering him as well. He kept waiting for it to cut out, for Atlas to falter. But every time he thought he might fail, his mind went to Keith. His love became a bottomless source of light. 

“He’s powering Atlas with his own vital energy!” said Coran. “Shiro! You can’t keep this up!” 

They hurtled through the sky, a sonic boom in their wake. On the horizon, the silhouette of the Black Lion appeared. 

“We’re expending huge amounts of power but our reserves are still sitting at 1%,” Veronica muttered. Then, to Shiro, “Sir, are you okay?” 

Shiro couldn’t answer. The glow of his quintessence had become an inferno. His love for Keith was inexhaustible, but his body was not. He’d been acting as a conduit for too long. He was a fuse about to blow. 

Atlas slowed as it drew level with the garrison base. With the last of his focus, Shiro set it down gently on the perimeter. The Black Lion lay crumpled at Atlas’s feet at the end of the long furrow it had carved into the ground on impact. Atlas knelt over it protectively. 

Coran and Veronica had left their posts. They stood just behind Shiro, one on either side, their faces full of worry. “Get me to Keith,” he told them. 

Then he let go of Atlas. The lines of connection he’d drawn through its structure and into the crystal receded back into his arm and closed themselves off. Without the feedback from the crystal and the strength of Atlas around him, he suddenly felt how very tired he was. 

He felt his shoulder attachment power down, and heard his arm drop to the ground with a metallic clang. Other hands reached out to catch him. His view of the bridge constricted, narrowing down to a pinpoint, and then was gone. 

\-----

He woke slowly and painfully. Each breath was a knife in his ribs. His body was so exhausted that he didn’t even seem to be attached to it. He tried to screw his eyes shut, but someone was holding the right one open. A light flashed into his pupil like a needle. 

“… covered in bruises, dehydrated, extreme exhaustion,” someone was saying. As Shiro’s eyes adjusted to the light and his vision resolved, he could see a young man in a white lab coat. He was shining a penlight into his eye. “But his reflexes are good. No serious injuries. He just needs some fluids and rest.” 

“If you want him to rest you’d better tie him to the bed,” said Veronica’s voice from nearby. “Look, if you’re sure he’ll be okay then I need to go see my brother. Take good care of him. He just saved the whole Earth.” 

His blurry surroundings sharpened just in time for him to see Veronica turn the corner and leave the room. He recognized this place. He was in the garrison’s hospital wing. The medic was fussing with his left arm, getting ready to put an IV catheter in it. 

“Keith…” he said, barely managing a whisper. 

“Sir! You’re awake!” the medic gasped. 

Shiro blinked his eyes and tensed his muscles, willing himself out of his drowsiness. “Get me to Keith,” he said, louder this time. 

“You shouldn’t move. You need to… Hey! Wait!” 

Shiro was already rolling out of bed. As soon as his feet hit the floor, his legs buckled under him and he fell heavily and painfully. He threw out his arm to catch himself, but one wasn’t enough and his face crashed into the tile. “Look,” he grunted at the medic. “Either you can take me to Keith, or I’m crawling to him.” 

The medic, very wisely, helped him into a wheelchair and rolled him down the hall to the trauma bay. 

Shiro heard the scene before he saw it. The shouting, the hurried footsteps, the clatter of equipment, the beeping of machines. On the ground at the end of the hallway sat the red paladin’s helmet. The faceplate was smashed out. Blood was dripping off the inside surface and making a little puddle on the tile below. Shiro gripped the armrests of his chair until his knuckles turned white. 

They turned the corner and there was Keith. Shiro clapped a hand over his mouth but couldn’t completely stifle a horrified groan. Keith was strapped to a stretcher. His neck had a brace around it. A clear plastic tube was taped in place where it went into his mouth. One side of his face was caked with blood from a deep wound at his hairline, the fresh blood washing the dried away and forming new layers as it went. Most of his armor had been removed, except for the left side panel which was pinned to Keith’s ribs by a large piece of shrapnel. People were all around him. Shouting over him. Working on him. The monitor he was hooked up to was flashing at least three different alarms. 

“I don’t get it,” a doctor was saying, her voice full of frustration. “He’s worse since we brought him in!” 

“He’s still losing blood…” said a nurse. 

“It’s not just blood loss! His temperature’s spiking, his blood pressure is in the tank, his breathing is erratic… it’s like he’s having a hypersensitivity reaction but all we’ve given him is…” 

“Could it be a transfusion reaction?”

“No, he’s getting type O negative. It’s a universal donor.” She pointed to a plastic bag of deep crimson blood hanging from a metal pole. A line of red ran from the bag down to a needle in the crook of Keith’s arm. 

Shiro launched himself out of his chair. Before he crashed to the ground, he managed to stagger to Keith’s side and tear the needle out of him. The bag of blood began to drain onto the floor. 

“Hey!” the doctor shouted. 

“It _is_ a transfusion reaction,” Shiro panted from where he knelt on the floor, his head swimming after his brief exertion. “You can’t give him any more blood. Of any type. He’s… he’s not completely human.” 

“He’s… not…” The doctor stammered as her face went from anger to understanding, then horror. “Oh, god. We already gave him two units.” 

“What does that mean?” Shiro demanded. 

The doctor swung back into action, addressing the answer to her team instead of to Shiro. “It means we need to get to surgery, now. If we can’t give him blood back then we need to stop his bleeding before he loses any more. Prep OR, switch out the blood for a balanced electrolyte solution, and get me some platelets.” 

They wheeled Keith away and before Shiro had a chance to ask them if he was going to make it, he was gone. 

\-----

Keith survived surgery. But his doctors didn’t look happy. They explained to Shiro that Keith had head trauma, broken ribs, a fractured pelvis. They’d pulled a piece of metal out of his side that had punctured his diaphragm, liver, and spleen. He’d lost a lot of blood which they had no way to replace. All of which would have been bad enough on their own, but none of those things was even his biggest problem. 

His biggest problem were the two pints of human blood in his veins that the Galra part of his immune system was viciously attacking. His fever hovered at 102 degrees, but his hands were cold and clammy. He wouldn’t breathe on his own. The tube stayed in his throat, and a machine next to his bed made his chest rise and fall in a too-perfect rhythm. A bag hung under his bed attached to a catheter. It filled over and over with urine the color of rust. Right after surgery his skin was so pale that it looked gray. The next day, it had turned yellow. Doctors hovered around him, arguing about his renal values and his hematocrit. 

Shiro took all this in, and then proceeded to drift in and out of consciousness for two days while his body recovered from the exertion of powering the Atlas with nothing but his own quintessence. He would sleep fitfully for a few hours, wake, grab the nearest person to his bed, and ask breathlessly about Keith. The doctors finally put them in the same room to keep him from scaring the nurses. 

Even after he was strong enough to leave his bed and put his uniform back on, he stayed in Keith’s room. Keith had become so tall and strong since his time with the Blades and Krolia, and had become such an accomplished paladin, Shiro had almost let himself believe that he was indestructible. Now Keith looked so small, dwarfed by the machines keeping him alive, his face slack, his body wrecked. 

To avoid the injured parts of him, Shiro held his hand. He squeezed it and moved the fingers back and forth, willing them to tighten on his. But Keith didn’t move. Not his hands, not his eyes. Not even his chest, except for the push and pull of the ventilator. It hurt to look at him. But it hurt more to be apart. 

He tore himself away from Keith’s bedside only when absolutely necessary to help with garrison business. Most of it, he trusted to Iverson. Iverson tried to convince him that, since the paladins were indisposed, it would go a long way toward morale for Shiro to put in more appearances for the garrison teams and for the floods of refugees they were now attempting to organize as the Galra prison camps were liberated. Shiro told him that he would put in all the appearances Iverson wanted as soon as Keith woke up. 

He also visited the other paladins as they came around. 

Lance was awake by the time he reached the garrison, and mad as hell that the doctors wouldn’t let him move around the hospital on his broken leg. He was happy to be surrounded by his family, but otherwise distraught. “I’ll bet you feel the same as me, huh?” he said glumly to Shiro when his family was out of the room getting food. “Like it’d be easier if we were hurt bad enough to still be out of it like the others, instead of awake and worrying?” Shiro couldn’t disagree. 

Allura was the next to be declared stable enough for visitors. She was in good spirits, though her coughing was painful and persistent. The doctors explained that without close monitoring and treatment, the residual salt water in her lungs would be life-threatening. So they took her vitals around the clock, cautiously gave her various medications, and muttered ruefully about the unpredictability of Altean biology. 

“Thank you, Shiro,” she said to him hoarsely, taking his hand in hers. “For saving my life.” 

Shiro replied, “We’ve been through so much together. Any of us would do it for each other, now.” 

“No, I mean…” she stammered. “Coran told me what happened. You could have saved Keith first. I know you wanted to.” 

Shiro stood abruptly, pulling his hand out of her grasp. “I have to go,” he said. Only when he was back in Keith’s room, with the door closed behind him, did the panicked ringing in his ears subside. He picked up one of Keith’s limp hands and pressed it to his lips. Keith’s skin didn’t even smell like him anymore. 

The whole garrison felt a surge of morale when the news got out that Pidge was awake. It had been touch and go for the first few days, but on day three her vitals evened out and on day four she opened her eyes. When Shiro entered her room, she couldn’t raise her head but she still wore a crooked smile as she grilled her father on his technique for hacking and destroying Sendak’s command ship. “And here’s the glorified computer node himself,” she said when she noticed Shiro. “Good work, Cap. Heh, you should have heard Keith when he realized you were on that ship. He was freaking out. He was so worried.” She chuckled, and Shiro tried to laugh along with her. 

Later, when she was napping, he asked Sam and Colleen if Pidge knew how serious Keith’s condition was. Sam frowned. “We told her the others are recovering, just like her,” he explained. “She’s still so weak. We don’t want her worrying.” 

Shiro avoided Pidge’s room after that. He didn’t trust himself not to give the truth away. 

Hunk was stabilized soon after arriving at the garrison, but he didn’t wake up for a full week. The doctors weren’t sure what the extent of his brain injury would be. There were a horrible few days when they weren’t sure if he would wake up at all. He lay there snoring, his vitals steady and strong, but without batting an eyelid. Shiro spent a lot of time with Hunk’s parents during that week, more than with any of the other paladins. They had a lot of questions that no one else was in a state to answer. Shiro told them about all their battles and adventures since Hunk had left Earth, about Hunk’s bravery and kindness, about how much Hunk had talked about them and missed them. It seemed to give them comfort, even as they wondered if they would ever get the story directly from their son. 

Then, on the seventh day, Hunk abruptly sat up in bed and declared how hungry he was. Shiro came in to the whole family in happy tears. Hunk was eager to hear about what had happened while he was asleep. Shiro told him the story. When he got to Keith, Hunk’s face dropped. He’d so recently been crying tears of happiness that there was no resistance when tears of fear and sadness welled up in his eyes. 

Hunk stiffened his lips and furrowed his brow, trying to put on a brave face though his eyes were still leaking. “Keith’s the strongest out of all of us,” he told Shiro. “He’ll make it.” 

And then they were all awake, and talking, and recovering. And still Keith slept. 

There was so much Shiro wanted to say, but no one he could say it to. He couldn’t burden the other paladins while they were trying to get better. Nor their families and loved ones, who were so happy at their own good luck. Not anyone else at the garrison, who wouldn’t understand. The only person he could imagine talking to was the one lying in front of him, his fingers limp in Shiro’s hands, his strength fading. 

Dying. 

\-----

Shiro was angry the first time someone came in to ask him to move the Black Lion. They tried to explain to him that it was in the way of repairs, that they needed to get to the wreckage underneath it to continue their salvage efforts, that no one else could pilot it and it was too big to shift with their other equipment. Shiro didn’t care. It took Iverson coming in and making it a direct order before he agreed to try. 

Returning to the lion was like walking up to a corpse. Shiro was used to seeing it sitting attentively in its hangar bay on the Castle of Lions. It seemed so wrong to see it lying on its side, as hurt and unresponsive as its paladin. 

Shiro clambered inside, which was difficult with the lion lying at such an angle. He made it to the cockpit and sat down in the pilot’s seat. No one had been in here since they’d pulled Keith out. Someone had left an open medical kit under the console. A few shards of glass from Keith’s broken face shield were on the floor. There were bloodstains on the seat. 

He started to reach out for the controls, but then his hands stopped in midair. He pulled his left hand back to squeeze it against his eyes. He hadn’t cried yet. But here, alone and in a place that had once been a haven for him, his emotions reared up like a giant wave and threatened to overtake him. 

He crumpled forward, shaking with barely-repressed sobs. “Keith,” he whispered into his hand as tears oozed out from between his fingers. “Keith!” 

A hand squeezed Shiro’s shoulder. “I’m here.” 

Shiro was so startled that he yelled and fell out of the pilot’s seat, landing on his knees. When he snatched his hand away from his face, the cockpit of the Black Lion was gone. He was on a glassy plain under a black sky that was impossibly bright with stars. He whipped around. Keith was standing there, awake and whole, more beautiful than Shiro had ever seen him. 

Keith grinned sheepishly. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.” 

Shiro surged to his feet and wrapped Keith up in an embrace. It wasn’t as good as a real hug. Keith’s form was indistinct in his arms, like the tactile version of radio static. But he could feel it, and he knew that Keith could feel him too. So he squeezed twice as hard to make up for their lack of physical bodies. 

Keith wrapped one arm around Shiro’s back and used his other hand to stroke Shiro’s hair soothingly. “I was hoping you’d find me here,” he said. 

Reluctantly, Shiro loosened his embrace and pulled back to stare at Keith. He was glowing and indistinct. A violet-tinged ghost. “How did you get here?” Shiro demanded. 

“I was dreaming, drifting. Lost,” said Keith, frowning and looking down. “You know how when I was on Sendak’s ship I reached out to my lion from far away? Well, I reached out again, just trying to escape. I ended up here.”

“You can’t stay.” Shiro was urgent, insistent. As good as it was to talk to Keith, it wasn’t good that his soul was in the Black Lion. It needed to be in his body. 

Keith shrugged. “It doesn’t hurt as much when I’m here.” He turned and walked, beckoning Shiro to follow. Shiro looked past him and realized that the Black Lion’s astral form was sitting just a few yards away. “Come on. I don’t know how much time we have. Come sit with me.” 

Keith clambered up one of the lion’s front claws to recline in the curve of the top of its paw. Shiro hurried to join him, not wanting to miss even a second of being together. Keith crossed his legs and put one hand behind his head, looking out at the stars. 

“It’s beautiful,” Keith murmured. 

Shiro settled nervously beside him, their arms overlapping between them. “You get tired of the view eventually, believe me,” he muttered ruefully. 

“I’m not dead, Shiro,” Keith sighed. Shiro stared at him. When Keith turned to meet his eyes, he flinched at the expression on Shiro’s face. “What’s wrong?” 

Shiro grappled with the words to make Keith understand. Here on the astral plane, he was bright and intact. He knew that he was hurt, but there was no way for him to tell how badly. “You haven’t seen yourself,” Shiro managed. 

Keith grinned. “What, did I lose an arm or something? Because that would be just _awful_. I mean, I wouldn’t be able to do _anything_ anymore.” 

“Did…” Shiro coughed. “Did you just make a joke about my arm?”

The light on Keith’s cheeks darkened in what Shiro thought might have been a blush. “Sorry. It was bad, I know.” 

“No, it was funny! I just wasn’t expecting it.” And in spite of himself, Shiro allowed himself to laugh. 

“Hunk and Lance are bad influences,” Keith offered as explanation, looking pleased with himself. Then his smile twisted into concern and he said, “Um, but really, Shiro…”

“Oh! No, you have all your limbs.” 

“Okay,” said Keith. “So I’m okay.” 

Shiro pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead. All he wanted was to enjoy being close to Keith. But he couldn’t let it go. “Keith, you’re not okay.” He grabbed Keith’s forearm, trying to press the truth into him, trying to keep him from slipping away. 

Keith stared at the stars, avoiding Shiro’s gaze. “Yeah, I figured,” he whispered. Then he said, louder, stronger, “Well, I mean. That’s fine. Dying to save Earth. That’s a pretty decent way to go out. I could handle that.”

The ringing in Shiro’s ears was back. Back in his body, he felt bile rise in his throat. He tightened his grip on Keith’s arm and yanked him, forcing Keith to meet his eyes. “How can you say that?!” he shouted. He got up on his knees to loom over Keith, who was still on his back and staring up at him in surprise. “It’s not fine! You don’t get to pull me out of the void and beg me to stay and then just leave me alone! That’s not fair! None of it is fair!” 

“Shiro…” said Keith softly. He reached up and cupped Shiro’s face in his hand. “Hey. Shiro, I’m sorry.”

Shiro’s body crumpled with his resolve. His anger burned itself up in an instant, and then he was falling. Keith caught him. He tucked Shiro’s face into his collar and held him there, his hands forming fists in the fabric of Shiro’s shirt and in his hair. And Shiro clung to him, crying. Really crying for the first time since the battle. Deep, ugly sobs for everything he’d lost and everything he still stood to lose. Keith just held him, his breathing coming ragged as he choked back tears of his own, waiting for Shiro to speak. 

“I could have saved you,” Shiro said once he had control of his own voice. “The others had help. It was between you and Allura. And I could have saved you, but I didn’t.”

“It’s okay…” Keith tried to say. 

Shiro protested. “You both needed me. I chose her. Because… there were others who could help you, but I was the only one who could help her. But also… because I was in command. And I was afraid that if I chose you, it was only because I was being weak and selfish.” 

“You did the right thing,” said Keith. But he didn’t really understand. He was just trying to say something that would make Shiro’s pain go away. 

“Okay,” said Shiro, his voice darkening. “But I regret it. If I could go back, I’d choose you. I’d save you. I’d do anything. Let anyone die. I’m weak, Keith. I’m selfish. I need you.” 

Keith stroked Shiro’s hair. “No,” he whispered. “That’s not you.” 

“But it’s how I feel. I can’t look at them. Because I’d wish they were dying, if it meant you were okay.”

Keith pulled away just enough to look Shiro in the eyes. He put his hands on Shiro’s face and swept the pads of his thumbs across his cheeks. There were no tears in this astral plane, but the gesture was comforting all the same. “Why are you telling me this?” he said. 

“Because you’re the only one I can tell,” said Shiro. “The only other person I’ve ever been able to talk to like this was Adam, and he…” He felt his chest tighten and his face crumple again, and Keith drew him back into the safety of his arms. 

“It’s not fair,” Shiro choked out, his voice muffled against Keith’s chest. “Pidge’s parents were waiting for her and Matt is on his way. Lance’s family is huge but they all made it. And Hunk thought his family was gone, but he found his parents and they’re finding more of his relatives every day as the work camps get liberated. But Adam is just dead. I only had one person! Why couldn’t one of them have lost one person, and I could have kept mine?”

There were no words for this kind of pain, so Keith just held Shiro tighter in response. 

“And now everyone is awake and recovering, except for you. Why did it have to be you? Why is it only the people _I_ love who…” 

He couldn’t continue. Keith held him while he cried, and repeated back, “It’s not fair.” And this time he sounded like he understood. 

This world existed outside of time. Shiro had no idea how long he’d spent in Keith’s arms. But eventually his anguish exhausted itself and flattened itself out into numbness. Keith rubbed a hand up and down Shiro’s neck and the back of his head, reminding him that he was there. When Keith finally pulled away and stood up, it could have been minutes or hours or years and Shiro wouldn’t have known the difference. Only that he wished he could have a minute, an hour, a year more. 

Shiro lay on the lion’s paw, curled up, exhausted from crying. He watched Keith as he stretched and looked out to the horizon. “I’d better get going, then,” said Keith. 

“Going?” said Shiro, his heart racing. 

“Not like that,” said Keith. “I mean back to my body. Because if that’s how you feel, then I guess I can’t die. So I’d better get back and start working on surviving.” 

Shiro stood and took Keith by his shoulders. It was what he wanted to hear. But fear still clawed at him. Keith was leaving this place, and despite his confidence Shiro didn’t know if he would get another chance to talk to him. To hold him. To kiss him. Shiro’s hands slid up Keith’s neck and cradled his face. He tilted his chin upwards, drawing their faces closer together. “Before you go…” he said. 

But Keith gently put his fingers to Shiro’s lips and pushed him away. “Save it,” he said. “You’ll get another chance, I promise.”

And then he was gone, and Shiro was sitting in the cockpit of the Black Lion, alone. 

\-----

Shiro went back to the medical wing and stared at Keith. The doctors tried to get him to return to his own quarters, but he brushed them off. The sun set behind the Black Lion, still in its crater. He didn’t sleep at all that night. He just waited for some sign that Keith was keeping his promise. 

The next day, Keith’s color was better. The doctors said that his blood work had improved. Shiro fidgeted with Keith’s fingers and talked to him in a low voice. When he said, “Wake up so I can kiss you, already,” he thought he saw Keith’s eyelashes twitch. 

Keith started fighting the ventilator tube, swallowing and gagging around it. The doctors pulled it out. He kept breathing. 

His fever broke. His skin cleared up. His sunken eyes lost their shadows. The machine monitoring his vital signs beeped along happily. 

It had been days. Shiro tried not to sleep. He sat in a chair by Keith’s bed and held his hand, or gently touched his face and hair. When he got too drowsy, he paced around the room to keep himself alert. He always circled back around to lean over Keith’s face, willing his eyes to open. 

Keith sighed sometimes, noisy little breaths that were almost syllables. His eyebrows scrunched together. Now, when Shiro squeezed his hand, Keith’s fingers fluttered down to weakly squeeze back. 

He didn’t look hurt anymore. He didn’t look like he was dying. He looked like he was asleep – the kind of shallow, cautious sleep that he’d learned as a boy, just around the corner from wakefulness. 

“Come on, Keith,” said Shiro. He was sitting in his usual chair, his elbows propped up on the edge of Keith’s bed. Behind him, moonlight was streaming in through the window. “Come on. You’ve done so well. You’re so close. Just open your eyes.” 

\-----

Keith drifted in and out of dreams. Oblivion swallowed him, then spat him out into another memory or wish or fear, then pulled him under again. He saw his mother, his memories of her all twisted up with her memories of him by the quantum abyss. He visited his father, enjoying the quiet night air on their porch without any of the turmoil or urgency of the last time he’d dreamed about him, during his trial with the Blades. He drove his bike off the cliff in the desert over and over again. Sometimes he crashed. Sometimes he flew. 

He piloted the Black Lion among unfamiliar stars. The peace and solitude were absolute. He felt like he could drift in the ebb and flow of the universe forever, unconnected to anything or anyone. Then he blinked, and the other lions were flying in formation around him. 

He fought. Zarkon, Lotor, Sendak. Galra, humans. Bullies from school. Shiro. He fought with blade and bayard and with his fists, not knowing why. The battles had no beginning or end, but existed purely in the moment after and before that deep, dreamless sleep rose up to drown him again. 

Pain hounded him all the while. Dull aching during the good dreams. Waves of agony during the nightmares. Sometimes he gained enough clarity to remember that he could run from that pain back to the Black Lion and that peaceful astral plane. Instead, he turned toward his injured body and pushed into the pain, welcoming it, owning it. 

He struggled his way up the current of his pain toward wakefulness, but reality was a ceiling he couldn’t quite crack. Dreams and nothingness swirled around him. He pushed them away. Shiro’s voice called out to him. He held onto it like a lifeline and pulled himself up. 

When he opened his eyes, the first blush of sunrise was on the windowsill. His eyes were bleary. His body was heavy. His mouth was dry. He waited. Oblivion didn’t arrive to swallow him. He was awake. 

Something solid and heavy was pressed against the side of his leg. He lifted his head to see Shiro sitting in a chair, his upper body resting on Keith’s bed. His massive right forearm was pressed against Keith’s thigh. Inside the crook of that arm was nestled Shiro’s head, his face turned toward Keith, fast asleep. He had dark circles under his eyes. His expression of exhaustion and worry, with that soft flip of white hair plastered across it, made him look so young. “Shiro,” Keith tried to say, but his voice was so hoarse that almost no sound came out. 

His hand was resting by Shiro’s cheek. Every movement took effort, but luckily it was just a matter of turning his arm over once to rest his hand on Shiro’s face. He stroked his thumb back and forth until Shiro twitched, then stirred, then groaned, then woke. 

“Keith!” Shiro gasped. He stood so suddenly that his chair toppled over. He cradled Keith’s face in his hands, his right one almost enveloping Keith’s whole head. 

Keith leaned into his touch and managed a smile. “You saved me.” 

\-----

The word was out. Earth was free. The hard-won victory injected life into the fleeing and flailing resistance. The remainders of the Coalition came out of hiding one by one to flock to this new beacon. The planet of the Voltron paladins. 

Ships started trickling, then streaming, then flooding in. Earth became an intergalactic hub within weeks of Sendak’s defeat. She welcomed one and all. Old friends and allies and complete strangers. Soldiers and refugees. Immigrants, as well as her own sons and daughters arriving home. 

Keith amazed his doctors. His Galra physiology, when it wasn’t trying to murder him, made him heal faster than anyone they had ever seen. His fractures knitted and his bruises faded. He stood up, with help, and took a few careful steps. They pulled all the catheters out of him and peeled the monitors from his skin. They still wouldn’t let him leave the hospital. Shiro agreed to help enforce his bed rest but admitted to the doctors that his authority and rank meant nothing to Keith and that he’d never really been able to get him to do anything he didn’t already want to. 

“We got another transmission from your mom,” said Shiro as he adjusted his uniform in the mirror of the bathroom attached to Keith’s room. Keith was in bed, for once. His head wound had been the slowest to heal, and today the ache was making him tired. “She and Kolivan should arrive later today. Early tomorrow, at the latest.” 

“We should go down to the docks and meet them,” said Keith. 

Shiro’s uniform fit a little awkwardly where it had been customized around his right shoulder, but he decided that it was as straight as he was going to make it. He stepped away from the mirror and sat on the edge of Keith’s bed. “Your doctor already said no. Besides, they’re going to have me shaking hands at this memorial celebration into the evening. And I can’t slip out. I’m kind of recognizable.” 

“Captain of the Atlas, Voltron of Earth,” said Keith sleepily. He tried to smirk, to make it a tease. But he just sounded proud. It made Shiro feel warm. 

He put a hand on Keith’s chest and pressed him gently into his bed. “Stay here. Get some sleep. I’ll be back when Iverson’s done showing me off.” 

He started to stand up, but Keith caught his hand. “Hey,” he said, fighting his drowsiness to sit upright. “Before you go. You still owe me something.” 

They hadn’t talked yet about their time on the astral plane. If not for a few oblique references from Keith, Shiro wouldn’t even have been sure that he remembered it. And Shiro had been more worried about Keith’s recovery than in collecting on that delayed kiss. 

But now he leaned in without hesitation. Keith watched him approach, his eyes only closing at the last second. Their lips met. The touch surged like warmth, like electricity between them, and with a breathless relief Shiro felt a weight lifted off him that he hadn’t even known he was carrying. Keith’s breath was hot on his face. When Shiro parted his lips and deepened the kiss, his teeth were sharp on his tongue. 

Keith wrapped his arms around Shiro’s back and pulled their bodies close. Shiro sank his fingers into Keith’s tangle of hair. It was only when Keith brought a hand around to squeeze the top of his thigh that Shiro reluctantly pulled away. 

“Later,” he promised. 

Keith fell back against his pillow with a huff. “Fine,” he whined. But his cheeks were flushed and there was still a smile on his face. 

Shiro glanced at the clock. The ceremony was starting soon. “Gotta go,” he said, standing up and moving toward the door. 

Keith was already dozing off, but he gave Shiro a little wave and answered. 

“I’ll be here when you get back.”


End file.
